It's Just TOO COLD!!

It’s been awhile since I’ve written in my blog. It’s not that I haven’t been writing - I’ve been working on my novel. With all of these bone chilling wintry days we’ve been having, it’s been a good time for me to put my nose to the grindstone and immerse my thoughts into the story I am creating. I’m not finished with it yet, but I realized yesterday after sitting at the computer for almost six hours straight, it was time to come up for air and return to the real world. So, here I am, back into my Collection of Days, still at my computer, but pressing my brain into another direction for a little while.

It’s cold, cold, cold in Georgia! We have a dusting of snow on the ground that’s here for the second day without having melted. Very strange for this part of the country. In a perfect Georgia world, it would have all melted away yesterday with the sunshine that we had, and we’d be looking at a cool, but sunny day. But we are experiencing a most unusual deep-freeze here in the south, and the temperature never went above freezing all day. We’re looking at another frigid day today.

I am not a dressing -in-layers kind of girl, so this does not please me one bit. I’m just a big cold weather sissy. After struggling with at least a dozen layers of clothing yesterday afternoon, I ventured outside with Diamond to go for a walk. I felt like the Michelin man, and waddled my way down the steps into the blustery deep-freeze. At first, the only part of my body that could feel the fresh air was my face, and it told me immediately that I should go back indoors. I ignored the messages my cheeks and nose were sending me and pressed on, knowing that Diamond loves her daily walks.

So far, so good. We made it to the end of our dirt road and onto the pavement, hitting a big patch of black ice. With a quick detour onto the crunchy shoulder, we maneuvered past this hazard, avoiding an unwanted ice-skating adventure. Remembering the December I was in Chicago helping Wade after he had surgery, I thought about how cold I was there. This was eerily familiar. But this isn’t Chicago, this is Georgia! It’s not supposed to be this cold here.

As we walked, I was staying very warm from my neck to my thighs, but the rest of me was feeling the pain. My fingers and toes were cold and beginning to ache, even with warm gloves and hands in pockets. The feet were a different story. My walking shoes won’t hold more than one pair of socks and still lace up. I tried jogging, hoping to send some warm blood down in that direction. Didn’t work. By the time Diamond and I reached the beaver pond a half-mile from the house, I knew it was time to turn around and cut our walk a couple of miles short.

Finally back into my warm home, I peeled off all but the last layer of clothing and left them in a pile in my closet. Freed from captivity of too much on my body, I went into the kitchen, turned the heat on underneath the kettle, and prepared a huge mug of hot tea. Warming my hands on the sides of the mug, and with my feet cozily tucked into my fuzzy slippers, I dreamed of springtime.

It can’t be too far away, can it?